Alphabet Weekends - Elizabeth Noble [116]
‘A bit.’ He nodded slowly.
Natalie couldn’t take her eyes off a curl by his ear. His profile was so very familiar to her. The sun was hot on her back. She pushed her sunglasses off her face and took his hand, raised it to her mouth and kissed it.
Tom turned to her. His face was very close to hers, and suddenly she kissed his mouth. A light, quick kiss.
The pilot was watching them. He’d flown into the canyon 1782 times. On the 958th time, he’d flown his girlfriend in and asked her to marry him. It was a good sort of place for that sort of a thing. He smiled to himself and gave them an extra minute or two.
‘What was that about?’
‘I don’t know.’
Tom kissed her back, then stood up and pulled her to her feet. ‘Come on.’
Back in the helicopter, Natalie took Tom’s hand.
‘Still frightened?’
‘No,’ she answered, with a half-smile.
If the Grand Canyon had been a miracle of nature, the Venetian was a man-made one. One of the vast hotels that lined the strip, Natalie had asked the courtesy driver to drop them off there after their flight landed. The guide book said it was unmissable, she claimed. Tom could cheerfully have missed it. It was hot, and the Bellagio’s pool was calling him. At least there was air-conditioning.
‘Who thinks this up?’
‘I read about it in the guidebook. Didn’t some bloke build it for his wife so they could ride around the canals of Venice without ever having to go to Italy? Isn’t that genius?’
‘Of a sort, I suppose. But did they really think this was what Venice was like?’
‘It is, kind of. It’s like Disney does Venice, isn’t it?’
It was lunchtime in the real world – if you could call the Las Vegas strip, with its outdoor travelators and white tigers, real – but in here, in St Mark’s Square, it was dusk. Carnival-type street performers, masked and colourful, juggled and conjured for passers-by, and ‘authentic’ Italian gelato was served off carts. Along one side was a shopping mall. ‘I don’t remember there being a Jimmy Choo on the real St Mark’s Square.’ And running through the centre was a ‘canal’ with improbably blue water, trafficked with battery-operated gondolas. Each one had a gondolier, of course, singing ‘O Sole Mio’, and ‘Santa Lucia’ in operatic voices too good for the dismissive audiences passing by.
‘It’s terrible! It’s antiseptic Venice. They’ve taken away all its charm. It’s too perfect.’
‘They’ve taken away the smell, too, though, haven’t they?’ Natalie had only been to Venice in a sweltering July, on a school trip one year when she was about fifteen, and she remembered the smell rather better than the Bridge of Sighs – as fifteen-year-olds are wont to do.
‘You’re a Philistine.’ Tom had spent a week there, the summer he went round Europe, and had loved its decaying, tatty beauty.
‘Does that mean you’re not taking me in a gondola?’
‘Do you seriously want to go?’
‘I seriously do. We weren’t allowed, in the fifth form. Mr Briggs thought we’d all muck about and fall in. Besides, it cost a fortune.’
‘I’m sure it’ll be a complete bargain here.’
‘Forget it, then. Doesn’t matter.’
Tom pulled her along by the arm. ‘Don’t sulk. Course I’ll take you. But only on the condition that you promise to come with me to the real Venice one day, and let me show you how infinitely superior it is.’
‘That deal works for me.’ Natalie smirked at him.
It was, of course, stupidly expensive. The couple in the queue in front of them wanted to ride alone, but hadn’t paid enough for the exclusive service so they reluctantly watched Tom and Natalie climb in, assisted by their Japanese gondolier, who was no more than four-foot tall.
‘Good job he can work it with a pedal,’ Tom whispered.
‘Ssssh!’
The ‘Welcome to Venice’ spiel had started. Tom shook his head incredulously and sat back.
Opposite them, the other couple started kissing. Tom tutted like a teacher. Natalie glared at him, and took a huge interest in the shops on the canal bank. But it was almost impossible not to stare – they were about two